What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of good-byes.
— Wilfred Owen
“Anthem or Doomed Youth“
More than 1.1 million Americans have died in war during the nation’s history.
Each of them gave his or her life in defense of the freedoms on which this nation was founded.
Most, however, have receded into the past, lost amid the stories of generals and statesmen that make up our history books, consigned as footnotes to the larger movements of history.
In 1958, prior to the burial of the Unknown Soldiers of World War II and the Korean War, John C Metzler, superintendent of Arlington National Cemetery, told Cosmopolitan magazine:
“I will tell each person what I have told others in the past — that exactly who the men on the hill are is not as important as the fact that they are there. Being there, they are not only representative of other men who died unknown, but of all men who have fought for America. For that reason, they belong to all of us.”
It is the efforts of the individual soldier, the airman, the sailor that have helped us win and retain the liberties we hold dear and it is in their honor that we set aside Monday as a national holiday.
Not all wars were popular or necessary. Some were divisive. But that should not diminish the efforts of the millions who served our country over the years.
Memorial Day — officially recognized as a national holiday by an act of Congress in 1971 but celebrated since 1863 — is a day for remembrance.
For more than 130 years, we have recognized the sacrifices made by the men and women who died in the line of duty, not to glorify their efforts or the battles in which they fought, but to pay homage, to remember.
It is a truly dramatic reminder of the cost of freedom, to know that 1.1 million gave their lives for something we all believe in.
And it is a reminder of the horror that war is. While we remember and honor the heroes of our past wars, both dead and living, we should take some time to reflect on the havoc and ruin that war almost always leaves in its wake.
Those 1.1 million were sons and brother, fathers and husbands, daughters and sisters, mothers and wives. And they are just a fraction of the men and women who died during the past 225 years, men and women of all races and ethnic groups, from all nations.
We should remember and honor the lives lost at Lexington and Concord, Bull Run and Gettysburg, the destruction and devastation of Pearl Harbor, Dresden and Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the nightmare that was Vietnam.
And we need to make a promise to ourselves to try and prevent these costs from coming to bear for future generations.
